Park Benjamin (1849–1922) was an American patent lawyer, physician, and writer. Benjamin graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1867 and published a
book of his etchings of the academy that year. He resigned from the
Navy, and after a year at law school was admitted to the New York Bar in
1870. He studied science at Union College and received his Ph.D. in
1877. Before completing his doctorate he was assistant editor of
Scientific American (1872–78) and then editor-in-chief of Appleton’s
Cyclopaedia of Applied Mechanics (1879–96). By the time Benjamin began
working at Scientific American it had become more associated with the
commercial side of science and patenting of inventions. He was editor
when Edison brought in his phonograph to the Scientific American patent
agency, and its uses were for the first time described in an 1877 issue.
Both Edison and younger brother Dr. George Benjamin were contributors
to Appleton's when P.B. began editing. Benjamin wrote three books on the
history of electricity, one on the Voltaic cell and one on the U.S.
Naval Academy.